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Interviewing with the NSA
George Maschke writes "'Interviewing With an Intelligence Agency (or, A Funny thing Happened on the Way to Fort Meade)' is a humorous and entertaining account of one man's recent experience seeking employment with the National Security Agency (NSA). But this story, newly posted to the Federation of American Scientists website, is also one with a serious message. Written under the pseudonym 'Ralph J. Perro,' it includes discussion of the job interview, psychological testing, polygraph, and background investigation. It will be of interest to anyone contemplating employment with a federal intelligence agency."
Just wondering, but is it legal to post this sort of information? I would believe that this is classified to some sort of level, since the NSA doesn't want wannabee-feds to prepare for the (psychological-) tests. Makes sense he/she uses an pseudonym indeed, but is it really that way?
In need of reliable and affordable server monitoring?
Lie detectors are not effective. This is just being used to scare people into thinking they can't lie.
;)
Seems to me, if they scare people into thinking that, then they are effective. Not functional, but effective.
This comment was generated by a squadron of trained super elite albino ninja chickens for you.
There are relatively few things that disqualify you compared to what they ask you. The purpose of most of the questions and polygraph is that they get full disclosure of what you have done. They need to know all the skeletons in your closet, so they can't be used as blackmail against you.
Espionage often starts very simple. One instance I was told about was about a civilian consultant who asked a military person to buy them cigarettes at the Post Exchange (to avoid taxes). They worked together and the soldier didn't see anything wrong with helping the guy out. More purchases were made with the soldier accepting cash kickbacks on the savings.
This was used as leverage to get him to give them some information. The soldier thought the info was harmless and that this would get him out of it but really he was just more involved. From there it can just get worse and worse and he has more to hide.
The NSA doesn't really care that you tried pot 6 years ago as long as you're not trying to hide that fact. Someone that wants that fact hidden is a prime candidate for getting started down that slippery slope. It would probably start with something harmless, "Tell me what time so-and-so gets to work or I'll tell your entire church you smoked dope." If you're a neurotic person that needs to hide your past actions and pretend you were always the law-abiding, church goer that you are now then that may be perceived as a real threat that you'd go for.
t
The problem with the NSA, like all government agencies, is bureaucracy not maleficence. They kept having you come back for polygraphs because some rubberstamper would give you a stamp of approval until your polygraph test was perfect. Even though everyone knows that a polygraph test is unreliable. What you should have done is taken some yoga classes and then you would have passed. But instead you continued to view the NSA officer as some Wizard of Oz type character so you could never pass the test.
Do not taunt happy-fun-ball.
What is the deal with people on slashdot not wanting to read PDF files? Why do we need warnings that a link is to a PDF?
It's certainly not about standards compliance (Slashdot generating incompliant HTML 3.2 code anyone?) And, it's not about supporting patent encumbered file formats (GIF instead of PNG, multiple articles on MP3 players)
So tell me, honestly. Why do people have such a hard time with PDFs?
Overrated / Underrated : Moderation
Makes sense. If they can't calibrate the polygraph in your case, they can't tell whether you're just being very truthful, if you're so psychopathic that you don't care when you're lying (hence no physiological reaction), or if you've developed sufficient control over normally involuntary physical responses (eg through biofeedback training) that you're conciously suppressing a response to a lie.
Either way, it tells them that they can't tell when you're lying. Which, conversely, means they can't tell when you're telling the truth either. Which means they can't trust you enough to hire you -- no matter how trustworthy you really may be.
-- Alastair
This is definitely true, however it doesn't matter. You still will be required to take one if you're looking to get cleared, and you will still have to deal with the inaccuracies of the test...
I took a polygraph 2 days ago for my security clearance to work at the NSA as a contractor (very top-level clearance, after months and months of background checks and questionnaires). I have never done anything seriously wrong, aside from shoplifting some things while a teenager and various other small-time things that really do not matter much. I've never touched illegal drugs. However, during the test, he decided that I was lying about three things:
Serious crimes I have committed
Drug usage in the past 5 years
Providing false information on my security forms.
He was a nice guy, though, and after his analysis, we talked about it, and it basically boiled down to the fact that the polygraph doesn't really detect if you're lying, it just detects if you have any symptoms that could be related to lying after asking a question. When he asked about serious crimes (which only apply to murders, rapes, and felony larcenies like embezzling and what not), I thought about every wrong thing I had done in the past. This triggered a response on the machine.
We talked about that, I told him everything that went through my mind, and he told me that none of those things matter now, and that I shouldn't be concerned with them when answering the questions. The same thing happened with the other questions. He then re-administered the section to me regarding these things and he said that it was "much better, but not perfect." I imagine someone with a conscience that is much less-overactive would do far better than myself.
Remember, these tests simply measure what you think might be lying, not what actually is a lie. So if you feel that the $20 you stole from your dad's wallet was so morally reprehensible that when it runs through your mind you feel that you were a criminal, then you would most likely appear to be lying about your past serious criminal offenses, even though the NSA doesn't care about it at all.
If you can't pass a polygraph test, regardless of whether you are lying or telling the truth, then what kind of intellengence agent would you make? If you were captured and tested by an adversary suspecting you of being an operative, you better be able to pass a polygraph.
It implies the NSA is listening to your phone conversations.